Newsmaker | Balladeer Gaddar’s daughter in Telangana poll fray for Congress: Who is G V Vennela?

Gummadi Vithal Rao, known as Gaddar (a moniker that means rebellion) and praja gayakudu (people’s singer), was a prominent face of the Telangana statehood movement and an activist for the rights of Dalits and marginalised communities. In the months before his death in August at the age of 77, Gaddar had grown close to the Congress.

Gaddar refrained from joining electoral politics even though he had been a social-cultural icon for decades. In 2010, he launched the Telangana Praja Front to unite Dalits and the backward classes and advocate for a separate Telangana state. Vennela and her brother G V Suryam, however, were not involved in the party, which folded up after Telangana was carved out of Andhra Pradesh in 2014. Late last year, the poet launched the Gaddar Praja Party intending to contest elections but fell ill shortly after.

A graduate of Osmania University, Vennela has a PhD in management studies and a PG Diploma in school management. A mother of two, she manages the Mahabodhi Vidyalaya, the school Gaddar established in Secunderabad’s Alwal neighbourhood. Although a political novice, she hopes that senior Congress leaders and those who supported Gaddar will help her in her campaign.

The Congress’s Telangana chief Revanth Reddy says Vennela was picked because of the legacy of Gaddar, who had grown close to the Congress and declared his support for the party. Gaddar was last seen in public on July 2 at Khammam on stage alongside Congress MP Rahul Gandhi at a public meeting and his close aides said at the time that he might contest in Assembly elections.

Vennela is set to face a tough battle against the Bharat Rashtra Samithi’s G Lasya Nandita, the daughter of five-time MLA G Sayanna who was a hugely popular Scheduled Caste (SC) leader in the constituency and won the last two polls. Sayanna died in February. The BJP has fielded Mekala Sarangapani, the general secretary of the party’s Secunderabad unit.